to flip so quickly
by Generouslyinnercheesecake
Summary: Damian figures out something about himself in the worst way possible /TW: suicide attempt
1. The Fall

A/N: DISCLAIMER: All public characters, settings, etc. are not mine and are property of DC comics. I am not making money off of this work. All my original characters/plot are property of me, the author, and I am not associated with DC comics in any way, shape or form.

TW: this story contains a suicide scene. if you are triggered by those things, along with behaviors exhibited during a hypomanic episode, please do NOT read this story. this TW is for your safety.

a/n: this two-shot would not be here if not for @ae-in! please check them out on tumblr! (@stargirl_interlude on A03)

———

Damian Wayne was no normal boy. Never will be. Never has been. His mother never planned that for him. Nor his father, when he took Damian in.

Damian tried to blend it—to follow the social norms of American society while also understanding he was to never be truly 'normal'.

_Never is a great, imposing word_, Damian thought as he looked down upon the Gothamites, his feet mere inches from the edge of the building which was towering over the busy citizens. It was at least 500 feet above them, and the Robin costume felt like the proper barrier to remain hidden from those passing civilians. He didn't want anyone to know.

Wait—did he? Did he want someone to find his body? Did he want it to be respected, or passed by those same civilians which were on their way to the graveyard shifts? How would they react? Horrified? Or happy at the opportunity of finding the 'annoying Robin' dead in his own pool of blood?

Damian stilled. They would find out his identity, along with his splattered guts lying on the sidewalk.

Did he want that?

He thought he did. He wanted some way to end the pain and have everything go dark. To have everything to just...stop. For time to stand still forever. For the pressure. For the haunting, never ending memories.

He knew it was melodramatic. To kill oneself. Also, perhaps selfish. Selfish if one had a caring, normal family. But Damian didn't have that. He had an occupied, stony family that was plagued with one another's various traumas. His family protected, though, despite that trauma.

But Damian didn't protect.

Not like his father. Or brothers. Or sister.

He hurt. He ridiculed, attacked, and killed.

He was no better than his mother.

He deserved this.

However, the thought of having his insides possibly being consumed by rats on the sidewalk stopped him. For now.

Perhaps tomorrow. Or the day after that.

* * *

Father had accused him of going off-route on patrol. He was right. He did do that. Maybe not for the reasons he had thought of. Maybe instead to contemplate his life while one step away from falling off a tall building. But still.

"Damian," Bruce growled. "As Robin you have a responsibility to listen. If you fail to do so-"

"There's a possibility of death. I know, Father," Damian interrupted him. And to be completely honest, that made irresponsibility tempting.

Bruce clenched his jaw, and Damian could see the way he shut down. The way Damian does when he's too overwhelmed. When he can't take the frustration or sadness or anger. "You are still a child, Damian. And you are still your mother's son."

Damian didn't blink for a few moments.

Like his mother's son.

Despite everything: her placing a bounty on him, her attempting to kill him various times, her abusing, manipulating him for the majority of his childhood. He was _still_ her son.

It seems as though everything he tries he can never escape her.

Except for one (little) thing that could stop this. The pain, the criticism, the looming figure of someone who was supposed to love him but failed miserably.

Death.

Bruce continued after shaking his head disappointedly, "I'm _this_ close to benching you, Damian." Damian's breath stuttered. "You're reckless and irresponsible. We can't have you out on the field when you so blatantly disobey me."

Damian felt his fists creak under his skin, feeling as though he was itching to get out of his own body. To finally leave. Permanently. His fingers created crescent marks, almost breaking skin.

Bruce sighed heavily when he got no response from his son. Then: "Go to your room." Damian stiffly turned around and began soldiering to his room. He heard Bruce mutter under his breath, "_Though you won't listen...never do_." And his heart dropped down to his sore feet.

A surge of anger coursed through him as he trudged up the manor stairs. How could he? How could he feel this way when he did this to himself?

_I'm the most ignorant, self-centered person I know. _

* * *

Damian stared at the stripped blade in his hand. He had managed to break open a razor he had left in his bathroom cabinet, and couldn't help but think of his entire life leading up to this moment.

The irrefutably happy moments—where he had complete control of his life and was able to accomplish anything. Like a god. Like some powerful being neither his mother nor father could break. The moments where he thought he knew what he was doing, leading to more deaths. The moments where he hurt the people he was supposed to love. The moments where he was hated for being honest on a really important interview that was supposed to go well but couldn't because he was reckless and didn't care about the tomorrow. Just wanted to live so freely now. And forever.

But that always changed when he fell again.

It was subtle, when the euphoria faded and was replaced with guilt and this irrefutable sadness. When he could barely keep fighting to become a better person because he didn't care. He didn't care to become a better person because he would be dead tomorrow. Or the day after that.

This was one of those weeks. Months? It's felt like years.

He clenched his fist around the razor, and the blood seeped from his palm. He loved the feeling of the blood trickling down his tanned skin.

Skin he shared with his mother.

Damian didn't think when he began filling the tub with hot water. Didn't think when he got in with his clothes still on, the unorthodox feeling of wet clothing sticking on his skin not fazing him for one moment. Didn't think when he held the blade in his bloodied palm and pushed and pushed it into his skin. Didn't think when he closed his eyes and leaned back onto the tub and let the waves of relief wash over him.

Didn't notice when the clock struck midnight.

A few seconds? Minutes? Hours? Passed by in a single moment. He hated how slow this was to be—the blood was still gushing out of his forearm and yet he was still conscious. He wanted it to slip from him now.

"Alfred made ya' some dinner, Damian!" He heard Dick yell out. The man was most likely in his room and yelling out to the bathroom door thinking he was using the restroom. Damian didn't know why, but his heart rate jumped.

Damian didn't reply, but slumped lower into the now-lukewarm tub. He closed his eyes again and took a deep breath to calm his racing heart. He heard Dick hesitate, "Damian?"

Damian opened his mouth, but nothing came out. It suddenly hit him—what he had just tried.

He couldn't let Richard see him like this: so weak and impulsive. Dick usually visited once a week to talk about cases and 'hang out' with Damian, and Damian realized that with this he would never experience that again.

Lost in his own thoughts, he didn't notice when Grayson cracked open the door with worried eyes. He didn't notice when the door slammed against the wall and Grayson began shouting for Bruce. Didn't notice when his body was lifted into warm, broad arms and asked too many questions to comprehend. What came out of his mouth was a jumble of words that made no sense even to him.

Then dark.

* * *

He woke up with Tim at his bedside, the tapping on his tablet calming and lulling him back into sleep. However, when Tim looked up from the screen, eyes bleary and red, Damian suddenly felt as though he could never sleep again.

Drake had seen him. In this state. This embarrassing, shameful state that made him want to suddenly scream at the top of his lungs. To let everything out and let it be there in the universe for once. To not suppress so much.

Damian glanced down at his wrists, one of which was bandaged, and saw the handcuffs linking him to the bed. So he did just that.

Scream.

Screamed so much his voice turned hoarse. Until Tim called Bruce and Dick and he was injected with a fast-acting sedative and arrived back into sweet unconsciousness.

* * *

Bruce panted as he held the now-empty syringe and looked down at his son.

"He was-" Tim stopped himself as he looked down at his hands. "I don't know why-"

Dick interrupted him, eyes narrowed and helpless at the same time. "It doesn't matter, Timmy. What matters is that he's okay."

Bruce's eye twitched as his gaze broke from the syringe to his son. His unconscious, apparently _suicidal_ son.

"I think he's doing this for attention," Bruce admitted.

Dick gaped at him while Tim lifted his head, his eyes unreadable. Dick's eyes suddenly turned angry. "That's the dumbest shit I've ever heard you say, Bruce-"

"He did this when I threatened to bench him, Dick. We've been focused on the recent case and didn't allow Damian to look over it for the fact that it was too brutal even for him."

Dick pinched the bridge of his nose and took a deep, calming breath. There was no need to get upset when Damian was there in _a fucking hospital bed after trying to kill himself._ Dick needed to remain strong for Damian, his family.

"It makes sense, Dick," Tim whispered, as though he were scared of the reaction.

Dick bit his bottom lip, then scoffed angrily. "Whatever," he muttered. "We need to help him first."

"How do we help him if we don't know what's wrong?"

Dick wanted to scream at Bruce because he was right.

* * *

In this mood, time seemed to move slower. The colors were less vivid. The world around him seemed to change less. The faint specks of dirt on the windowsill were more noticeable.

"Are you still feeling suicidal?" His father would ask at least twice a day. Damian didn't know if it was out of concern or obligation, but it was still infuriating to be coddled over. Mostly due to the fact that Damian had never been coddled, and never wanted to be coddled. He's his own person and deserves privacy.

His privacy was taken away from him when he tried to slit his wrists.

Someone was always around him at all times (save for the restroom), whether that be Dick, Tim, Alfred, Cass, or even Barbara or Jason. Granted, most people had simply let him be in peace while only being in the same room to monitor, but it still felt like an invasion of privacy.

'Damian Duty,' it was deemed. A term for looking after their shameful youngest.

It was when he heard the term that his failure fully hit him. He failed at doing the one thing he had wanted to do for years before. Why would he do that to himself? How could he do that to himself?

He doesn't even deserve to die—to be a coward and avoid everyone and everything. He deserves to sit and sink into his misdeeds and mistakes. Memories he can't escape.

Cowards don't deserve to die. They deserve to suffer and live.

He had an prolonged anxiety attack, the day the implication hit him. It lasted the entire day. All because of the implication that he doesn't deserve to die because he is that much of a failure.

Everyone gave him water, petty reassurances, good hearted pats on the back but it was useless. He was _nothing_ to them.


	2. The Rise

A/N: I promise in this chapter that Bruce will become more like able. At least I hope so. Also, I apologize if Dick may seem a lil OC.

———

It was two weeks after the attempt that he woke up feeling refreshed, as though he had been under hypnosis for the past three months. He woke up with a smirk at the corner of his mouth, and the sudden need to play with Titus, talk with his father (to give him some viable reason as to why he did what he did), and catch up on his art.

His mind was working five minutes ahead of himself. And as he jogged around the manor with Titus happily prancing beside him, he felt the blooming presence of life. The love for the bright world around him. The green of the bushes was a vivid spring in the previously dark colors. It was refreshing to see the red roses and the pretty pink of the nectar fruits again. Damian directly picked one from the tree and bit into it. It was a great, sour taste, yet also an endearing sweet. A perfect balance to such an extreme taste.

He needed to make some coffee, perhaps add more cream and sugar than necessary because he was craving so after the sweet nectar fruit, and begin on his schoolwork. He hadn't caught up in a while and needed to do so. He knew he was going to go on patrol tonight (the first in two weeks), so he needed to begin stretching and going over certain maneuvers. Although he knew he didn't need to. He was proficient in everything he did, even if it was for the first time.

When he gulped down his coffee with shaking hands, he realized finally that his previous thoughts were unnecessary. Those depressing thoughts that led to him attempting were nothing but that—thoughts. How foolish of him to act on them!

It was really all in his head. He was cured. There was no need for him to try that and worry his family. He was happy now (by his own choice, of course) and didn't need help. This sudden happiness would remain forever and he would prosper to be the amazing man he always knew he could be.

Call him arrogant, but he's simply telling the truth.

* * *

"Bruce, there's something wrong with him. I know it," Dick stared firmly. His eyes were wild, desperate.

Bruce grunted. He didn't know how to feel. His son was newly happy. How was he to change that? It only seemed beneficial. Showed that he was moving on from his attempt and finally growing.

"Bruce!" Dick yelled, and the older man almost jumped in shock. "Do you realize how much he's changed in only one night?!?" Dick was screaming, now, and Bruce knew there was no way he could stop Dick when he began. "Do you know what he asked me, Bruce?!" As though Bruce would actually know it. "He asked me if he could join the circus with me!" Dick's tone dropped to a deadly one. "Don't tell me that's Damian just being happy. He would never say that."

Bruce stilled, blinked. Then: "No. He wouldn't."

Dick slapped his forehead. "Fucking duh, Bruce!" And Bruce knew he was frantic in the way he used such vulgarity. "Damian does not just have depression. Get Damian some real fucking help before he does something stupid again. Before _I_ do!"

Dick paced out of the cave, Bruce mulling over his words. He didn't want to believe his son had a severe mental disorder, because that meant he failed as a parent. Was it his fault? Did he push Damian too far? Perhaps Talia did?

So many questions that he couldn't answer.

* * *

"Are you on drugs?" Bruce asked a few nights after. After he had caught his son out on the streets of Gotham without his permission.

Dick's tongue lashing had woken Bruce up from being oblivious to his son's sudden mood change, and now that Bruce saw what was truly going on he realized how concerned he should be. Bruce finally saw that the young man, when he wasn't training, was working on art, playing with Titus, or actually talking with his family. Damian was constantly working, not even finishing the tasks he previously set out to do.

That wasn't his son.

Yes, Damian would rather be occupied than lazy, but Damian always finished a task before moving onto something else. When Bruce saw his son's art room, it featured tens of pieces, most of which were only partially painted and a couple done with only pencil sketches. Damian had always prided himself on his art, but his current pieces were messy, half-done. The lines weren't straight, the faces asymmetrical, and the paintbrushes dirtied until they were stiff.

However, Bruce became seriously concerned after the conversation with Dick when he saw Damian's hands shaking, the tremors so slight the average eye would not be able to see it. Bruce's concern grew into something worse when he saw the excessive coffee intake, and the inability to keep one line of conversation at a time.

Bruce recalls weeks where Damian would act like this—so..._lit up_ and _active_ and _artsy_ and more irritable than usual. Until it would crash down and he would be hidden back in his shadows for weeks with no end in sight. Then it would repeat.

"No," Damian snapped back. He was growing inpatient, with all this concern. He was happy now. He didn't need anyone.

"Robin-"

"I need to go help some civilians," he interrupted, his fingers dwindling at his sides. "Unless you want to stop me, _Batman_," Damian mocked. Then left before Bruce could reply.

Bruce slitted his eyes.

* * *

"I think you're going through a manic episode," Bruce told him one night.

Damian scoffed as he did another pull-up. "That's ridiculous, Father," he insisted. "I'm cured."

Bruce stilled, feeling angry yet not knowing why.

"You're _what_?"

Damian's smirk was arrogant, to say in the most kind manner. "I am cured, Father. I don't desire death anymore. I am more than the boy I used to be. I am now grown-up, past those childish ideals."

Bruce clenched his jaw as he felt tears invade his eyes. He couldn't know why he felt suddenly emotional. Maybe it was due to the fact that he never saw these behaviors before, that he had just blamed it on teenage mood swings.

"I think you're manic, Damian," he repeated.

Damian suddenly turned angry, like a defensive cat looking over her litter. If he had one, his tail would be turned straight up. "I am _not_ deficient, Father," Damian snarked at him.

Bruce pursed his lips, tilting his head up to stop the rising tears. Why had he never considered this?

"I'm taking you to the doctor tomorrow, Damian."

He left the weight room with a screaming, kicking Damian behind him.

* * *

Bipolar Disorder.

That's what the psychiatrist told him the next day.

A two-hour session filled to the brim with personal questions that seemed too on-the-nose for him. That he related to. A lot. _Too much_.

Despite that—the resonance—he didn't want to believe it. It had to be some conspiracy, because there's no way Damian Wayne would have _that_.

_That_ was not what mother wanted.

So he refused medication. He didn't want something that would only hurt this new, refreshing happiness. He was unstoppable. He needed no one and nothing. Not some useless drugs that would only make him sad again.

Damian was sent upstairs by his father after the appointment. Damian made sure to make a show of stomping.

* * *

"Dick?"

"...Yes, Bruce? Did something happen with Dami again?"

"..."

"Bruce!? Please. Please don't say he-"

"Dick."

"Is he okay? Is he _alive_!?"

"He's hypomanic right now."

"...what?"

"He had bipolar disorder type two. He had a low, now he's at a high after only three months of depression. Doctor Karr said he's rapid cycling and he'll most likely crash within the next week or so."

"..."

"You were right, Dick."

"I'll see you in twenty."

* * *

He was prescribed meds two weeks later during his new depressive episode. He couldn't take it anymore. He couldn't take being in that same state at he was before. The same state that made him understand why he wanted to kill himself. They began working within a week.

He felt a bit out of his own body with the medication, but the doctor said that would be a symptom. The medication didn't do much but lessen the voices in his head. The rest would need to be fixed behaviorally.

He tried. He really did. He tried to adjust and play by the rules and obey but he simply couldn't. He thought the medication was supposed to be doing something and it wasn't and that was just so frustrating. It was frustrating that nothing would work with his fucked up brain.

He stopped taking the meds that when that hypomanic episode hit. He didn't believe he needed them anyways.

His father yelled at him, Grayson gave him his trademark look of pity, and Alfred gave him his disappointed one, but Damian didn't care. He didn't care. Because then he would crash back down and this vicious cycle would go again and again and again it was never ending _why is it soneverending???_

The psychiatrist adjusted his meds. Damian's episode flatlined and hope was on the horizon.

But as Damian looked down at Gotham, the citizens resembling ants in the big picture of life, he was still scared. He has a feeling he'll be scared for a long time. He can't decide if that's a good thing or not.

* * *

The disconnection between you and the people you love is what hurts the most.

* * *

Batman was silent when he grappled up to the top of the building. It was exactly one year since Damian's attempt, and the whole family was still recovering from the shockwave of a not-okay Damian Wayne. Damian, himself, too. His medication was adjusted at least four times in the single year, and every time he needed an adjustment he felt himself growing more impatient. Perhaps there really was no medication out there to help him?

Currently, he was in a depressive episode.

He could tell by the way his brain told him to jump off the building.

The same building he had almost jumped off of a year ago.

"Robin?" Damian didn't look up, instead kept his eyes glued to the Gothamites passing by to rush to their homes. To their families. It was 8:45, and most civilians had finished work within the last hour or so.

Bruce blinked behind the cowl. "Robin," he repeated with a firmer voice. Damian twitched, and Bruce pulled out his grapple gun incase he needed to make any haste recoveries.

"Yes, Father?" Bruce breathed a bit lighter.

He knew his son was depressed right now. Only one week ago he had finished a hypomanic episode. Bruce had learned to observe the small indications when Damian made a mood switch, from the excessive coffee and training to the sudden urge to communicate more. The way he upheld himself, defended himself.

Why couldn't he see these things beforehand? After the attempt?

"Are you feeling suicidal right now?" Bruce asked lowly, feeling a lump in his throat begin to form. _I'm sorry, Damian_ lied at the tip of his tongue.

Damian closed his eyes. Felt the air rush across his skin as his shoulders finally relaxed after what had felt like years. Felt the presence of his father, somehow reassuring in his time of desperation. In a way that it was never like before. "Yes." Damian's throat clicked.

Bruce clenched his jaw, then slowly creeped towards Damian, as one would when encountering a snippy, venomous serpent. He refused to make a single sound when he finally reached Damian, pulling the boy down from the ledge. Damian breathed a sigh of relief, though he couldn't know why.

Bruce's hands were likely to leave bruises on his son's shoulders, but Damian didn't care. Wanted to be reassured, held by the one person that he felt was against him after his attempt.

"Are you okay, Damian?" Bruce asked, the whispers lost in the wind. He already knew the answer, but didn't want to hear it.

Damian's bottom lip twitched. It was almost imperceptible. "No," he choked out. Because it felt never ending. The toll it was taking on his body, on his mind to experience it—to so quickly switch between two parts of himself he both loathed. He hated it. He hated himself. He hated the world and any god that made him this way. He hated the stardust, the very thing that created him. He hated the man that was holding him just then—hated the way he hurt him at one of the worst points of his life.

"I hate it," Damian whispered into Bruce's shoulder.

Bruce's breathing stuttered. "I'm sorry, Damian," he apologized. And both father and son knew it was not for the way Damian was feeling currently. They both knew it was for the tension that was never broken between the two. The lack of any connection after the attempt. The lack of any form of affection after it. For the way Bruce hurt his son when he was at his most damaged.

Damian didn't reply, but Bruce didn't expect him to.

* * *

"Damian!"

Said 17-year-old tried to scoff in his eldest brother's chest. It was the next day. "Yes, Grayson?"

"Happy birthday," Dick whispered in his ear, then sweetly kissed the young man's forehead.

* * *

The connection between you and your family is what you love the most.

Damian knew that was true by the way his entire family came over later that afternoon to celebrate his another year being alive.

———

A/N: Thank you so much for reading. I'm so grateful that I was able to share this work with so many people. Thank you! All love!

/ Help is always out there. Love is always out there. Please contact your national suicide hotline if you need to. All love.


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